I am sure I’m not the only person who is emotionally drained right now after seeing the Season 7 Premiere of The Walking Dead. Yes, it is just a TV show and yes it’s based on a very popular comic book but if you’re a fan as I am and embrace these characters the way we have, it becomes so much more than just a TV show and there lies the power of great writing and great acting. Warning, spoilers ahead…
Since the finale this past Spring, everyone wondered who was Negan’s victim. If you read issue 100, you had ideas of whom it might be. But since the series has deviated from source material, speculation ran wide across social media. When the episode titled “The Day Will Come When You Won’t Be” finally came on, it began post death and it would be another 20 minutes or so before the first death was revealed to be Abraham. It’s no secret that the character had died in the books prior to meeting Negan but it doesn’t change the emotion you feel when you see him die. He was as defiant in death as he ever was in life and yes; I said first death, more on that in a moment.
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| R.I.P. Abraham (Michael Cudlitz) and Glenn (Steven Yeun) |
This episode was as much about Negan breaking Rick the man and the leader as it was in essence breaking us the audience. Moments after Abraham’s death, Negan taunts Rosita which causes Daryl to snap and strike Negan before being subdued himself. Negan warned Rick and the others that he would allow one outburst but not a second. With those words, the second gruesome death took place when, like the book, Negan struck down Glenn.
Rick warned Negan that someday, he would kill him for what he had done. Negan drags Rick into the trailer and drives off. He later forces Rick to fetch the axe he threw on the roof of the trailer while a swarm of walkers closed in them. Forever the survivor, Rick manages to pull together and retrieve the axe and fend off several walkers in the process. As Negan returns Rick to the others, he’s still unsatisfied by Rick’s lack of “respect” towards him even after all that has happened. He then forces Rick to make a decision. Either use the axe to cut his son Carl’s arm off or watch as his men shoot each member of Rick’s party. Rick makes a desperate plea and offers his arm in place of his son’s. Seeing that he has finally broken Rick, Negan let’s them go but not before taking Daryl and letting everyone know that he’ll be back to collect from them in a week.
It’s still hard to process both their deaths and for Rick and his people, this is only the beginning. For the foreseeable future this is Negan’s world and those who survived are lucky to be living in it.
May the Dork be with you,
JPB
The Dork Knight
